


Passim

by colberry



Category: the GazettE
Genre: ...eventually, Alcohol, But Aoi isn't gay or anything, Character Study, Food as a Metaphor for Love, Here be feels, M/M, Realization, Requited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-08
Updated: 2013-10-08
Packaged: 2017-12-28 19:37:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/995734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colberry/pseuds/colberry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Uruha reaches for epiphanies and Aoi waits.</p><p>Or:  that one time coffee was a matchmaker.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Passim

i.  
  
Uruha realizes that Aoi might like him on a damp, clammy Friday.  
  
It’s an elementary term.  He has to dust off the playground-cobwebs from the word – “like” and “ _like_ -like” drenched in sepia memory alongside tummy-butterflies and cooties.  But not _love_ because it’s too dangerous, too out-of-place and _not him_.    
  
When it happens, there’s sawdust on the floor, static bursting from amps and Ruki’s mic is spitting out gargled feedback from the onslaught of dreary weather.  The stars are hanging loose from the sky and there’s dark bruises underneath Uruha’s eyes – riffs and harmonies and tune extensions behind his eyelids.  Notes still thrum in his fingertips as Reita calls out for a break because _3AM is national cigarette-time._  
  
They all begin to disperse, like lost and dizzy comets trying to hold onto existence, and Uruha finds himself collapsed into the studio’s mint green couch.  He doesn’t bother to put back his guitar; the shoulder strap digging into his skin helps him feel _here_ when it would be so easy to _slip-away-goodbye_ into sleep.   
  
He’s just about to give in, caramel eyes listless and just so tired – _of insomnia, of instant ramen, of starving for glory_ – when a warm palm takes his hand and places a cup of coffee into his lax grip.   
  
Uruha blinks, regards the black coffee in his hand with puzzlement – something _needed_ and suddenly _there_ – before he looks up and sees Aoi.   
  
His midnight bruises are darker, deeper.  And Uruha wonders why he never noticed before and almost asks the elder if he even _has_ a bed ( _maybe he only has room for his washing machine and guitar_ ) – when Aoi shoves an open hand towards him.  It’s filled with every type of sugar and creamer that the vending machine has to offer.  
  
“I don’t know how you like your coffee.  So, here.”  
  
And in that moment of the moon crashing into the horizon, exhaustion nipping at their eyelashes and Aoi standing there with an awkward tilt to his head –  
  
Uruha might have slurred quietly as he reached for a creamer, _“Marry me.”_  
  
He didn’t notice the way Aoi’s hand twitched as he brushed those pale fingers for the creamer.  Nor the way those eyes suddenly _opened_ and softened from noir to brown.  
  
And so maybe, _maybe_ – Uruha thinks later when Aoi begins to loyally deliver him coffee-with-one-creamer whenever he begins to yawn in the eleventh hour – maybe Aoi believed him.  
  
  
ii.  
  
Everything is amber. The world tilts to a lazy left as Uruha catches himself on the brick wall, steps sloppy and eyes glazed. He can almost taste dawn, but the vodka still wet on his lips is stronger. Warmer. 

He can’t read the street signs.  Everything is a blear.  A streak of color that breathes heavily, that makes Uruha trip and graze his hands on the sidewalk.  Even if he could read it through his blurry eyes, the signs are foreign.  He’s wandered too far, this city too new for going out drinking alone.

But he was _too tired_ and _too caged_ to wait around for Reita or Ruki to appease him. 

So he’s swallowing the neon lights, the unknown avenues, the lonely whispers of prostitutes, alone.  Because he needs this – the sharp air and burning liquor – because he needs to surrender control for just a few hours.  Before he’s back to meticulously writing notes, painstakingly changing keys, carefully dedicating his life to this band.

He stumbles into another wall, lips brushing against the brick.  It’s cold.

The cell phone in his jean pocket beckons him, winning out over his pride to make it back to his apartment by himself.  He fumbles with it, accidentally turns on the camera twice, before he’s scrolling through the contacts.

_Reita, Reita, Reita…_

The numbers won’t stay still and Uruha finally just chooses one, mostly sure that it’s Reita – and if not, Yune. 

It picks up on the first ring.

“Kouyou?”

Uruha blinks.  Well, _that’s_ not who he wanted.  “Aoi-san, why’re you on th’phone?”

There’s a slight rustle of bed sheets.  “Because you called me.  What’s going on?”

Uruha doesn’t want Aoi.  He wants Reita.  He knows Aoi can ignite with spitfire so very quick, remembers the hot anger that the otherwise laconic man can wield, and he doesn’t want anyone mad at him.  Reita understands – he’s used to this, Uruha's penchant for amber nights.

“Sorry.  Wrong numb – ”           

“Where are you?”

He wants to hang up, but the vodka’s so warm inside him.  “I don’t know.”

The phone crackles, reception poor, but Uruha hears Aoi’s firm tenor all the same, “I’ll find you.”

And he does.  Twenty minutes have gone by when Aoi suddenly sits down next to him against the brick wall.  Uruha lifts his spinning head from his knees and looks up with an awe.  From this angle, the yellow, blushing moon their only light, Aoi looks like a nebula.  Ethereal.  Glowing.  Far.   

Uruha continues to stare as Aoi keeps silent, hands fidgeting now and then.  The younger gazes at the star-ridden raven hair; tousled midnight –  as if the elder had been running circles throughout Tokyo.  The slight flush to his cheeks and light sheen of sweat, the dark-noir bruises beneath his equally black eyes. 

Aoi finally turns to look at him and Uruha finds himself caught in his peculiar stare.  He can’t help blurting ( _realizing_ ), “You don’t have a car.”

Aoi sighs; Uruha can see the stardust falling from his eyelashes, “No.”

They sit there a while longer, in the midst of speeding cars and crooning whores, before Aoi pulls him up by his arm.  “Reita should be here by now.  He’s got his car around the corner.  Come on.”

And Uruha can’t say anything, merely lets himself be dragged along by that pale and shaking hand – still wondering how Aoi found him, if he had raced across Tokyo, if he had been breathless and cold and –

Aoi stops when they turn the corner and gives him a light push towards the awaiting Toyota, Reita already inside wearing an exasperated expression.  Uruha stumbles a little, still warm with alcohol’s shallow promises and hesitates.  Looks back.

With a worn smile, Aoi stuffs his hands into the pockets of his threadbare coat.  “Get some sleep, Uruha.”

But Uruha _sees_ those dark smudges beneath bloodshot eyes, and as he’s dragged into the car by a frustrated Reita, he wonders what makes Aoi’s sleepless nights so black.  
 

iii.  
  
Aoi plays his guitar like it’s a lost lover.

Holds it close.  Fingers loosely strumming the strings.  Like he’s afraid if he holds on too tight, _loves too much_ , it’ll run away. 

He cradles it.  Grips the neck gently because he knows his calluses feel rough.

And Aoi slip into the chords, murmur the melodies, whisper the notes like a broken lullaby.  Softly, yearning –

– like the world isn’t watching, but Uruha _is._    
  
  
iv.  
  
Uruha’s never been good with words.  He fumbles with the verbs and slurs the syllables, he makes simple phrases complex and prattles in endless circles.  So he doesn’t say anything.  He wishes he could – wishes he could just _say it_ , but _love_ is such an evil word and he’s not used to it.

He’s used to people yearning to _throw_ him against his amp, bruise his lips and dig their nails into his skin and _fuck him, take him, have him._

Not _love_ him. 

Not those pale hands and gentle eyes, not the soft questions of _“Is this chord fine?”_ nor the poignant longing for _this-right-here_ that drips into each performance when they share that platform –

– when Aoi leans in, drunk from the rush of adrenaline, and _tries_ because _maybe this time he’ll turn around and **look**._

But (like always), Uruha only smirks for the audience and keeps playing, leans the other way – because his heart is shaking.

Because sometimes he _fucking wants to_ – and then one time he _does_.  Grabs Aoi in the middle of their duet, guitar necks colliding, and crashes his lips against his teeth.  And it hurts.  _It hurts._

He doesn’t do it again.

Later, Aoi grins at the interviewer all the same, _“I thought for awhile that he wanted to get married.”_  
  
  
v.  
  
And when _that_ interview comes out – the one that makes Uruha’s chest _hurt_ each time he reads the lines over and over – Uruha rushes to the studio’s vending machine the morning after.  Because he's still not used to _that word_ , but he knows he needs to _fix this_ because maybe he just might –  

His impromptu detour makes him twenty minutes late to practice which consequently makes Kai chastise him and Ruki scoff, but he doesn’t hear the jibes of _my pace_ and _what else is new_.  He spots Aoi's lone silhouette over at the window, leaning out slightly to blow gray smoke, a white Pianissimo dangling from his pale and lithe fingers. 

And Uruha still doesn’t know what to say – he's still horrible with words, doesn't trust them – so he thrusts the coffee out in front of him.  Aoi startles, jerking his head back in from the open window and looks _caught_.  Regret and _fear_ coiling in his murky irises.  They both know what he said.  What he revealed in less than two lines of text.  How he bled his heart right across the gloss of the magazine pages.   
  
Uruha glances at the bruises that have once again come to rest beneath Aoi’s noir eyes.  Deep and dark.

“I don’t know how you like your coffee, so I put everything in it.”  
  
 _I’m sorry_.

Aoi tears his eyes away from Uruha’s sheepish gaze to peek at the younger's offer.  The coffee is nearly-white.  He doesn’t tell Uruha that he likes his black, one sugar.  Instead, he gingerly takes it from Uruha’s trembling hand and smiles, noir gaze softening to warm brown.

“It’s okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on LJ: August 2nd, 2011


End file.
